V. I. Lenin

Differences in the European Labour Movement{1}

Published:ZvezdaNo. 1, December 16, 1910.

      Signed:V. Ilyin.

      Published according to the text inZvezda.Source:Lenin
	  Collected Works,

      Progress Publishers,[1974],

      Moscow,Volume 16,

      pages345-352.Translated:Transcription\Markup:R. CymbalaCopyleft:V. I. Lenin Internet Archive (www.marxists.org)
      © 2004

      Permission is granted to copy and/or distribute this document under the
      terms of theGNU Free Documentation License.

Theprincipal tactical differences in the present-day-
labour movement of Europe and America reduce themselves to a struggle
against two big trends that are departing from Marxism, which has in fact
become the dominant theory in this movement. These two trends are
revisionism (opportunism, reformism) and anarchism (anarcho-syndicalism,
anarcho-socialism). Both these departures from the Marxist theory and
Marxist tactics that are dominant in the labour movement were to be
observed in various, forms and in various shades in all civilised countries
during the more than half-century of history of the mass labour movement.

Thisfact alone shows that these departures cannot be attributed to
accident, or to the mistakes of individuals or groups, or even to the
influence of national characteristics and traditions, and so forth. There
must be deep-rooted causes in the economic system and in the character of
the development of all capitalist countries which constantly give rise to
these departures. A small book,The Tactical Differences in the Labour
Movement (Die taktischen Differenzen in der Arbeiterbewegung, Hamburg,
Erdmann Dubber, 1909), published last year by a Dutch Marxist, Anton
Pannekoek, represents an interesting attempt at a scientific investigation
of these causes. In our exposition we shall acquaint the reader with
Pannekoek’s conclusions, which, it must be recognised, are quite correct.

Oneof the most profound causes that periodically give rise to
differences over tactics is the very growth of thelabour movement. If this movement is not measured by the criterion of some
fantastic ideal, but is regarded as the practical movement of ordinary
people, it will be clear that the enlistment of larger and larger numbers
of new “recruits”, the attraction of new sections of the working people
must inevitably be accompanied by waverings in the sphere of theory and
tactics, by repetitions of old mistakes, by a temporary reversion to
antiquated views and antiquated methods, and so forth. The labour movement
of every country periodically spends a varying amount of energy, attention
and time on the “training” of recruits.

Furthermore,the rate at which capitalism develops varies in different
countries and in different spheres of the national economy. Marxism is most
easily, rapidly, completely and lastingly assimilated by the working class
and its ideologists where large-scale industry is most developed. Economic
relations which are backward, or which lag in their development, constantly
lead to the appearance of sup porters of the labour movement who assimilate
only certain aspects of Marxism, only certain parts of the new world
outlook, or individual slogans and demands, being unable to make a
determined break with all the traditions of the bourgeois world outlook in
general and the bourgeois-democratic world outlook in particular.

Again,a constant source of differences is the dialectical nature of
social development, which proceeds in contradictions and through
contradictions. Capitalism is progressive because at destroys the old
methods of production and develops productive forces, yet at the same time,
at a certain stage of development, it retards the growth of productive
forces. It develops, organises, and disciplines the workers—and it
crushes, oppresses, leads to degeneration, poverty, etc. Capitalism creates
its own grave-digger, itself creates the elements of a new system, yet, at
the same time, without a “leap” these individual elements change nothing
in the general state of affairs and do not affect the rule of capital. It
is Marxism, the theory of dialectical materialism, that is able to
encompass these contradictions of living reality, of the living history of
capitalism and the working-class movement. But, needless to say, the masses
learn from life and not from books, and therefore certain individuals or
groupsconstantly exaggerate, elevate to a one-sided theory, to a one-sided system
of tactics, now one and now another feature of capitalist development, now
one and now another “lesson” of this development.

Bourgeoisideologists, liberals and democrats, not understanding
Marxism, and not understanding the modern labour movement, are constantly
jumping from one futile extreme to another. At one time they explain the
whole matter by asserting that evil-minded persons “incite” class against
class—at another they console themselves with the idea that the workers’
party is “a peaceful party of reform”. Both anarcho-syndicalism and
reformism must be regarded as a direct product of this bourgeois world
outlook and its influence. They seize upononeaspect of the
labour movement, elevate one-sidedness to a theory, and declare mutually
exclusive those tendencies or features of this movement that are a specific
peculiarity of a given period, of given conditions of working-class
activity. But real life, real history,includesthese different
tendencies, just as life and development in nature include both slow
evolution and rapid leaps, breaks in continuity.

Therevisionists regard as phrase-mongering all arguments about
“leaps” and about the working-class movement being antagonistic in
principle to the whole of the old society. They regard reforms as a partial
realisation of socialism. The anarcho-syndicalists reject “petty work”,
especially the utilisation of the parliamentary platform. In practice, the
latter tactics amount to waiting for “great days” along with an inability
to muster the forces which create great events. Both of them hinder the
thing that is most important and most urgent, namely, to unite the workers
in big, powerful and properly functioning organisations, capable of
functioning well underallcircumstances, permeated with the
spirit of the class, struggle, clearly realising their aims and trained in
the true Marxist world outlook.

Weshall here permit ourselves a slight digression and note an
parenthesis, so as to avoid possible misunderstandings, that Pannekoek
illustrates his analysisexclusivelyby examples taken from
West-European history, especially the history of Germany and France, not
referring to Russia atall. If at, times it seems that he is
alluding to Russia, it isonly because the basic tendencies which give rise to definite departures
from Marxist tactics are to be observed in our country too, despite the
vast difference between Russia and the West in culture, everyday life, and
historical and economic development.

Finally,an extremely important cause of differences among those taking
part in the labour movement lies in changes in the tactics of the ruling
classes in general and of the bourgeoisie in particular. If the tactics of
the bourgeoisie were always uniform, or at least of the same kind, the
working class would rapidly learn to reply to them by tactics just as
uniform or of the same kind. But, as a matter of fact, in every country the
bourgeoisie inevitably devises two systems of rule, two methods of fighting
for its interests and of maintaining its domination, and these methods at
times succeed each other and at times are interwoven in various
combinations. The first of these is the method of force, the method which
rejects all concessions to the labour movement, the method of supporting
all the old and obsolete institutions, the method of irreconcilably
rejecting reforms. Such is the nature of the conservative policy which in
Western Europe is becoming less and less a policy of the landowning classes
and more and more one of the varieties of bourgeois policy in general. The
second is the method of “liberalism”, of steps towards the development of
political rights, towards reforms, concessions, and so forth.

Thebourgeoisie passes from one method to the other not because of the
malicious intent of individuals, and not accidentally, but owing to the
fundamentally contradictory nature of its own position. Normal capitalist
society cannot develop successfully without a firmly established
representative system and without certain political rights for the
population, which is bound to be distinguished by its relatively high
“cultural” demands. These demands for a certain minimum of culture are
created by the conditions of the capitalist mode of production itself, with
its high technique, complexity, flexibility, mobility, rapid development of
world competition, and so forth. In consequence, vacillations in the
tactics of the bourgeoisie, transitions from the system of force to the
system of apparent concessions have been characteristic of the history of
all European countriesduring the last half-century, the various countries developing primarily
the application of the one method or the other at definite periods. For
instance, in the sixties and seventies of the nineteenth century Britain
was the classical country of “liberal” bourgeois policy, Germany in the
seventies and eighties adhered to the method of force, and so on.

Whenthis method prevailed in Germany, a one-sided echo of this
particular system of bourgeois government was the growth of
anarcho-syndicalism, or anarchism, as it was then called, in the labour
movement (the “Young” at the beginning of the

nineties,{2}Johann Most at the beginning of the

eighties{3}). When in 189O the change to “concessions” took place,
this change, as is always the case, proved to be even more dangerous to the
labour movement, and gave rise to an equally one-sided echo of bourgeois
“reformism”: opportunism in the labour movement. “The positive, real aim
of the liberal policy of the bourgeoisie,” Pannekoek says, “is to
mislead the workers, to cause a split in their ranks, to convert their
policy into an impotent adjunct of an impotent, always impotent and
ephemeral, sham reformism.”

Notinfrequently, the bourgeoisie for a certain time achieves its
object by a “liberal” policy, which, as Pannekoek justly remarks, is a
“more crafty” policy. A part of the workers and a part of their
representatives at times allow themselves to be deceived by seeming
concessions. The revisionists declare that the doctrine of the class
struggle is “antiquated”, or begin to conduct a policy which is in fact a
renunciation of the class struggle. The zigzags of bourgeois tactics
intensify revisionism within the labour movement and not infrequently bring
the differences within the labour movement to the point of an outright
split.

Allcauses of the kind indicated give rise to differences over tactics
within the labour movement and within the proletarian ranks. But there is
not and cannot be a Chinese wall between the proletariat and the sections
of the petty bourgeoisie in contact with it, including the peasantry. It is
clear that the passing of certain individuals, groups and sections of the
petty bourgeoisie into the ranks of the proletariat is bound, in its turn,
to give rise to vacillations in the tactics of the latter.

Theexperience, of the labour movement of various countries helps us to
understand on the basis of concrete practical questions the nature of
Marxist tactics; it helps the younger countries to distinguish more clearly
the true class significance of departures from Marxism and to combat these
departures more successfully.

{1}The article “Differences in the European Labour Movement”
was published in No. 4 of the newspaperZvezda(The
Star), in the section entitled “Letters from Abroad”.

Zvezda—aBolshevik legal news paper, the predecessor ofPravda; it was issued in St. Petersburg from December 16 (29),
1910 to April 22 (May 5), 1912 (at first as a weekly, from January 1912
twice a week, and from March three times a week). On February 26 (March
10), 1912, there appeared simultaneously withZvezdathe first
issue ofNevskaya Zvezda, which became the continuation ofZvezdaafter the latter had been closed down. The last, 27th,
issue ofNevskaya Zvezdawas published on October 5 (18),
1912. Contributors toZvezdawere: N. N. Baturin, K. S. Yeremeyev,
V. M. Molotov (Skryabin), M. S. Olminsky, N. G. Poletayev, J. V. Stalin,
and also A. M. Gorky. Until the autumn of 1911, pro-Party Mensheviks
(Plekhanovites) participated inZvezda. The ideological leadership
of the newspaper was carried out (from abroad) by Lenin, who published in
it and inNevskaya Zvezdaabout 50 articles.

Thelegal newspaperZvezdadirected by Lenin was a militant
Bolshevik organ which upheld the programme of the illegal
Party.Zvezdaestablished permanent close ties with the workers
and devoted an extensive section to workers’ correspondence. Thecirculation of individual issues reached 50,000-60,090. The newspaper
suffered continual persecution by the government; out of 96 issues ofZvezdaandNevskaya Zvezda, 39 were confiscated and 10
were subjected to fines.Zvezdaprepared the way for the
publication of the Bolshevik daily newspaperPravdaand was closed
down on the day thatPravdaappeared.

{2}The “Young” faction—a petty-bourgeois semi-anarchist group
formed in the German Social-Democratic Party in 1890 and composed chiefly
of undergraduate students and young writers (hence the name). It put
forward a platform that rejected any Social-Democratic participation’ in
parliament. They were expelled from the Party by the Erfurt Congress in
October 1891.

{3}Johann Most—German Social-Democrat. In 1880, at the Baden
Congress, he was expelled from the Party on account of his disorganising
behaviour. In the eighties he became an adherent of anarchism (see Marx and
Engels,Selected Correspondence, Moscow, 1955, pp. 375–76).